“Cock Roaches” is my pet name for those low-level pervs who get their kicks by doing stuff that makes women feel uncomfortable or threatened without ever actually doing anything that is actually actionable or reportable. They might stand too close, but never touch. They may touch, but always engineer situations to make it look like an accident. They may seek out situations where touching is appropriate, but carry it just a little bit too far (and I’m sorry to say that certain self-defence activities incorporating grappling are perfect breeding grounds for these scumbags). They may say something in an inappropriate tone, but using perfectly appropriate words. They may say something utterly inappropriate, but in a setting which is so safe (e.g. crowded room where nobody else can hear them) that people maybe be unlikely to believe they did it. They may be clever and dedicated enough to cultivate an “awkward but harmless” persona, which over time can get them an impressive amount of leeway in many or most social groups. They play a brilliant game, really, because they get their little pervy bennies without actually taking any risks.

Speaking to women, it seems that most of us have met at least one of them*. This is hardly surprising, because they’re ubiquitous. Statistically, they’re probably the number one self-defence concern for women in this time and place; although being physically attacked is obviously infinitely more dangerous, having to deal with a Cock Roach is infinitely more likely. Yet they seem to get broadly disregarded by most self-defence training, as if they were not a “real” problem – which, from a certain angle, they are not. Most of them are about as physically dangerous to us as a limp lettuce. The game they play is with and in our heads.

At the root of the issue is the fact that Cock Roaches only have any power at all because we, the women, give it to them. We give them the power to terrorise us. We give them rent-free space in our brain. We do most of their work for them, maintaining a situation where they can give us minimal input and be rewarded with maximum output, all at no cost to them. We do so because we’re socially conditioned to do so; but ultimately the important thing is that we are doing it, and we can stop.

The reason Cock Roaches are so effective is that they use social mechanisms pre-installed in women’s brains throughout our upbringing in order to get us stuck into a fear-induced freeze. They engage in one of their poxy barely-detectable misbehaviours, and we allow our brains to start spinning in all directions as a response. Half of our brain is running around in circles trying to determine what is actually going on. What is happening? Is this a predatory interview? A prelude to something awful? Just an awkward guy? Someone socialised differently from me, who is behaving perfectly normally by his rules? Why is it happening to me? Meanwhile the other half of our brain is running around in other circles trying to work out the potential costs, generally social costs, to various actions or inaction. What if I call out someone for being a perv, and he turns out to be “just a socially awkward guy,” and my entire social group lambasts me for it? What if the problem is with me, and I’m seeing things that are just not there? What if I don’t do anything, and he turns out to be a genuine predator trying to work out how weak I am, and I’ve just shown my vulnerability? How bad is this going to get?

When you’re stuck in the situation, it can seem genuinely unresolvable. You believe that you need to know what you’re dealing with to work out a suitable response. You can’t know what you’re dealing with for definite until the Cock Roach does something unequivocally wrong. The underlying belief – and it’s a belief, not a fact – is that they need to give you a justification for your actions, so that you may not be socially punished for taking them. So you’re left waiting for the other shoe to drop… but it never does. Meanwhile, every ounce of power in the game is with the ‘Roach. You’re completely on the defensive, and you can be kept in this state of fear and dread just as long as the ‘Roach wants to, which could be essentially forever. For someone who delights in making women feel afraid and doesn’t fancy risking jail in order to achieve that, this is as good as it gets.

When you’re not stuck in the situation, it can be difficult to understand how it can even come about. It’s all made up: it’s a mental torture chamber entirely constructed of wonky social conditioning, largely ludicrous assumptions, and a generous helping of faulty mind-reading. It can look very much like women doing all the work of tying their own brains up in knots with little or no effort on the part of the perv.

Yet it works – which is why it’s so common. Most women end up doing nothing and putting up with the creepiness, and often thinking that they are alone in this. We do not talk about it, or if we do we talk as we think, in ever-going circles.

Forgive me my nerdishness, but this is seriously one of those situations where “Fear is the mind killer.” The reason we can’t think our way out of this is because we are barely thinking at all, due to all the conflicting fears running through our brain. And none of the fears are necessary or helpful, and most of them are made up, but they are real to us because we were brought up to believe that they’re real. It’s a social conditioning problem, but the conditioning runs too deep in us for us to see it as such. The solution lies simply in letting go of the fear; in calmly evaluating the situation as an interesting social geometry problem. Not being overcome by fear allows us to think; it allows us to assess the situation rationally and to walk our way out of the maze. It also stops the Cock Roaches from getting their kicks – it literally removes all of the benefits from the game they are playing.

When you think about it calmly, the problem can be untangled rather simply. First of all, the way to work out whether someone is a genuinely nice but clueless person, either socially awkward or socialised under different rules, is to tell them that their behaviour is inappropriate in those settings and offer them a suitable alternative. Seriously, it’s that simple. Calmly and politely, without anger or fear, talk to them about it. Provided you don’t shame them in the process, people who genuinely don’t know the rules and who are not total assholes will be thankful. People don’t generally relish the prospect of making fools out of themselves or of making the people around them uncomfortable by acting inappropriately. “We don’t normally hug at work. We shake hands instead.”

Even if your preferences are completely idiosyncratic, people who are not giant flaming assholes and who have an ounce of interest in having a half-decent relationship with you will respect them, provided that they are reasonable and that you express them clearly and non-confrontationally. “I can see you are all huggers here but that makes me feel uncomfortable. I prefer to shake hands.” “I hug certain people at work because they are my close friends. I prefer to shake hands with everyone else.” People will no doubt make up their own explanations as to ‘what is wrong with you’ and may come up with conclusions infinitely more dramatic than they need to be, but the actual problem of their behaviour negatively impacting on you should go away.

If that doesn’t work – if you have clearly and non-confrontationally stated your reasonable preferences and they are being ignored – what you’re dealing with is either an asshole or a perv. For all practical intents and purposes, it doesn’t really much matter which one it is. Neither is treating you as an equal, as a person deserving of consideration and respect. Both are relying on you continuing to play by the rules, so they can continue to do vexing things at or to you without repercussions. Both rely on you being so invested on being nice, and/or in being seeing as being nice, that you won’t change the game you’re playing.

The thing is, you don’t have to do what they expect you to do. More importantly, you don’t have to feel what they want you to feel. They want you to feel threatened and trapped. They rely on you feeling like that so they can continue to get whatever sick kicks they get by making you feel like that, and so they can continue playing their little chickenshit game. They rely on you to hand over to them all the power in your relationship. If you don’t do that, they ain’t got shit.

Rory Miller talks about “being a sociopath on demand.” This is one of those situations that calls for it. The universe has handed you a person-shaped toy for you to practice all your non-physical self-defence skills without the least compunction. If you are suffering from any Machiavellian itches, this is the time to scratch them. Everything they do unto others, you have the right to do unto them. You’re not a hapless victim: you’re a force of karma, and they’ve just stepped on your toes.

So instead of looking at them like mysterious and uncontrollable monsters, look at them like the feeble vermin that they really are. Look at them like cowardly and obnoxious parasites crowding into your space. Watch them intently, not out of fear but out of genuine scientific curiosity. How do they get their pathetic little kicks? What can you do to interfere with their loathsome little games?

Most importantly and enjoyably, watch the change in their expression when they try to make you afraid and realise they can’t. That’s the pivotal moment in your relationship, and I swear it feels so good it must be fattening. The vast majority of them don’t have a backup plan. They can’t escalate without fear of repercussions. They can’t hide once you’ve spotted them. The mere fact of realising what they are and what they’re doing gives you an immediate upper hand.

Our fear of these wretches is both misplaced and counterproductive, but I realise that saying this may not be enough. Thinking through any issue may only get us partway there, and the first time you try this new attitude may require a leap of faith. It’s worth it, though. Aside from any personal gains in confidence and peace of mind, this attitude can spread like wildfire. We’re social animals; we’re designed to pick up working solutions from others and run with them. We’re designed to imitate what works, and this solution works incredibly fast and doesn’t cost us anything. So, in a very short space of time, you may end up changing an office-full of little girls running away from the big, bad perv into a place so full of empowered women that anyone with the least bad intention may be too scared to put a foot through the door… and wouldn’t that be a shame.

They’re weaselly little cheats, expecting to be able to ignore social rules yet have you still follow them, so they’re protected by them.

*I’m writing this article from a woman’s point of view because it’s the only point of view I can have. There are women who play a similar game, and the male victims are often in an even worse position than their female counterparts. Although women are generally not considered as physically threatening or as sexually predatory as men, this isn’t a physical game. This is a game about messing with people’s heads by causing them to balance various imaginary costs.

In most social groups in this society, women have an infinitely better chance of being believed when accusing a guy of sexual misbehaviours. Guys tend to have little or no social and structural support against a predatory woman, because that’s not how the commonly-held narrative goes. So a woman could be perfectly able to perv on a guy and then report him for perving on her. That’s a huge degree of power right there.